As an expert in finance, we don’t need to tell you how much you can save by ensuring that you get a steady stream of existing customers coming back to you. Obviously, all businesses need to attract new customers to continue growing – but you want to ensure that there is a contingent of returning customers, too. They bring in revenue whilst costing significantly less in company expenditures to guarantee the sale.
Unfortunately, you can’t ensure customers return on your own; you have to involve Marketing and Sales, which is where your CRM can come in handy.
Follow Up
The easiest way to get customers to come back to you is by simply remembering them. If you let it, your CRM does this for you. Help Sales implement a culture of placing reminders after phone calls to follow up at the date specified – or more broadly in the coming months if no date was outlined.
Marketing
Marketing shouldn’t be limited to new customers. Although it is traditionally known as a means of getting a lead interested in your company – and therefore the early stages of the funnel, Marketing can play a very crucial role in recycling customers. Nurturing leads is a great way of not only keeping unused leads warm but also keeping previous customers interested. A CRM is the best place to implement and track your lead nurturing campaign, with the lead scoring capabilities inbuilt within. Once again, it’s your duty to ensure that Marketing are aware of this and have suitable processes in place to benefit from it.
Incentivise
Discounts or offers are a great way of attracting previous customers to return. Use the information stored within your CRM to personalise these discounts, offering an incentive that’s so meaningful to them as an individual, they simply can’t refuse. Share this task out between Sales and Marketing, as it falls between both their remits.
Bolster Customer Service
Customer service can be the deciding factor for many consumers. People will go out of their way to find better customer service so make sure yours is up to scratch. Get your customer support staff to setup the CRM in such a way that you give your customers no choice but to return. Route query emails to the right people automatically, to ensure that a response and solution is given in time. Use your CRM to monitor your social media channels; it’s fast becoming the most important means of communication for younger customers.
If you’ve used your CRM correctly, you will have stored the customer’s history there; purchases, billing history, outstanding complaints and more. This information should help you pre-empt what a call may be about and get to a solution quicker.
Identify Profitable Clients
This is a role the financial team can get involved with more prominently; identify which of your previous customers has been the most profitable. It is true that attracting returning customers requires far less time and fewer resources than attracting new customers, but it still requires time and money. Use your CRM to identify which clients brought in the most revenue, which customers required the least amount of time to do so and which customers are worth avoiding. Forward this information back to Marketing & Sales to help them refine their campaigns and strategies and ensure the profitable clients are the clients who are regularly returning to you.
